ax and hachet

[litng1]

What's the proper why to keep your blades sharp?Where do you guys buy the stones or can you use a bench grinder.Thanks

 

[Outlawmws]

Don't use a bench grinder you will over heat the edge.

Most of these do not have a heavily hardened edge. You can get by for touch ups with a circular stone generally; for redefining the profile when its been improperly sharpened at too blunt an angle you can generally use a file to get that done.

One of the exceptions to the reasonably soft steel used are the "hewing hatchets". They have (or used to have, no clue how they make them these days...) an inlaid hardened steel section on the flat side, and those are tougher to resharpen properly. the main head is soft enough to file, but the hardened steel insert is not. (The also have/had a hardened steel inserts on the "hammer" face, and this is so brittle I see them chipped sometimes)

 

[Hetman]

Use belt grinder with fine belt.

 

[saigon66]

I think the axemen here in Australia use an oil stone but the old stone wheel to start the sharpening process they use water not oil. You could contact the Australian axemens page.

 

[litng1]

Thanks for info.

 

[camarotoolman]

Grinder if chiped, them belt sander. I've recycled 100s of them.

 

[sometoyotaguy]

I used the grinder on my shed hatchet. Of course it was chipped from years of neglect from the PO. It seemed to be sharp enough after grinding for delimbing of some branches. Of course it also got used to hack up a couch to get it out of an apt, and needed to be resharpened.